Down
We had a meeting yesterday, and there was one person there who alway's is rather obnoxious. She just is rude to folks. At the meeting she was in rare form, and was being dictatorial and yet at the same time unfocused and slow as molasses. Well, she got my goat, so to speak, as I was talking to the instructors about how they needed to have high standards and expectations in their instruction, and that our department tries to aim our intensity of exam questions so that the average student will earn a C or a C+ grade (this is both an attempt to have students demonstrate deep understanding and to avoid grade inflation). This policy is long standing and is well understood, but some of the newer faculty were ending up having averages that were in the A or A- range because their exams were too simple and their instruction too basic. That part of the meeting went well, and then I opened up discussion for questions. One simple question by some new folks were about policies about returning grades to students. I outlined our standard policy about being careful in team taught courses to work together in determining a uniform method of grade delivery of the instructors were team teaching with another faculty member, when this nasty person speaks up and very rudely says I am wrong and that she only does it "this way". I felt like telling her in the meeting that she was a rude idiot and did not apparently know or understand how to work with others in a team, but I did not do so and simply restated more firmly the Department's policy. She became even more huffy and rude in her statements to me. I then simply moved on with the meeting.
Unfortunately, she annoyed me greatly. And, I unfortunately felt aggravated all the rest of the day. I still feel resentment towards her. It is hard for me to figure out how to let this anger go. Her behavior really reflects badly on her, so I SHOULD just let it go, but I am having a hard time doing so.
PipeTobacco
6 Comments:
Oh, dear, not sure what you could do - murder is out of the question, of course. Some people WILL NOT listen to reason. And, some people just rub a person the wrong way. I hope you are able to let it go.
She does sound rude, Professor, but my advice would be to focus on the substance of the issue. For some reason, she thinks her method of grade delivery is the correct one irrespective of what her co-instructors do. Maybe she expects them to follow her practice. Is her self-belief consistent with evaluations of her performance?
Actually, she is one of our weaker long-term instructors. I understand that I should just let my resentment go. But, I unfortunately find it difficult to do so when a person is rude or impolite to me, especially when I did nothing wrong. I should be better at this, but it must hit my buttons of either insecurity or the desire to be liked. I have an idiot icy tendency to gnaw on these sorts of slights for days and/or weeks.... which intellectually I know is foolish, but it is difficult for me to figure out how to not do so.
I don't think there is much you can do to change her attitude or ideas. I understand having stuff like this gnaw at you and I let this kind of crap effect me way more than it should. Eventually it goes away, but I never figured out how to make it go away faster. Let me know if you figure it out.
I don't have anything new to add, because everyone else has already made their points so well. I sympathize with your difficulty in letting it go when you've been treated unfairly.
sigh*.I'd have to call her on her bullshit..and bet everyone would cheer you on..
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